Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2021;55(4):286-296.
doi: 10.1159/000515393. Epub 2021 Jun 28.

The Burden of Dementia due to Down Syndrome, Parkinson's Disease, Stroke, and Traumatic Brain Injury: A Systematic Analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019

Collaborators, Affiliations
Review

The Burden of Dementia due to Down Syndrome, Parkinson's Disease, Stroke, and Traumatic Brain Injury: A Systematic Analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019

GBD 2019 Dementia Collaborators. Neuroepidemiology. 2021.

Abstract

Background: In light of the increasing trend in the global number of individuals affected by dementia and the lack of any available disease-modifying therapies, it is necessary to fully understand and quantify the global burden of dementia. This work aimed to estimate the proportion of dementia due to Down syndrome, Parkinson's disease, clinical stroke, and traumatic brain injury (TBI), globally and by world region, in order to better understand the contribution of clinical diseases to dementia prevalence.

Methods: Through literature review, we obtained data on the relative risk of dementia with each condition and estimated relative risks by age using a Bayesian meta-regression tool. We then calculated population attributable fractions (PAFs), or the proportion of dementia attributable to each condition, using the estimates of relative risk and prevalence estimates for each condition from the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019. Finally, we multiplied these estimates by dementia prevalence to calculate the number of dementia cases attributable to each condition.

Findings: For each clinical condition, the relative risk of dementia decreased with age. Relative risks were highest for Down syndrome, followed by Parkinson's disease, stroke, and TBI. However, due to the high prevalence of stroke, the PAF for dementia due to stroke was highest. Together, Down syndrome, Parkinson's disease, stroke, and TBI explained 10.0% (95% UI: 6.0-16.5) of the global prevalence of dementia.

Interpretation: Ten percent of dementia prevalence globally could be explained by Down syndrome, Parkinson's disease, stroke, and TBI. The quantification of the proportion of dementia attributable to these 4 conditions constitutes a small contribution to our overall understanding of what causes dementia. However, epidemiological research into modifiable risk factors as well as basic science research focused on elucidating intervention approaches to prevent or delay the neuropathological changes that commonly characterize dementia will be critically important in future efforts to prevent and treat disease.

Keywords: Burden of disease; Dementia; Global health; Meta-analysis; Public health.

PubMed Disclaimer

Figures

Fig. 1.
Fig. 1.
Meta-regression of relative risk of dementia by age for Down syndrome, stroke, TBI, and Parkinson’s disease. Trimmed data refer to data points that were identified as outliers in the modeling framework. The inverse variance scale sizes the data points according to the certainty of the data such that larger points have less uncertainty and more weight in the model. TBI, traumatic brain injury.
Fig. 2.
Fig. 2.
Global PAFs of dementia for Down syndrome, stroke, TBI, and Parkinson’s disease, by age and sex in 2019. PAF, population attributable fraction; TBI, traumatic brain injury.
Fig. 3.
Fig. 3.
Global dementia prevalence due to Down syndrome, stroke, TBI, and Parkinson’s disease, and the prevalence of dementia unaccounted for by these 4 clinical conditions in 2019. a All categories including the residual category of dementia prevalence not attributable to the clinical conditions examined in this paper. b A zoomed-in view of the prevalence attributable to each clinical condition. TBI, traumatic brain injury.

References

    1. Prince MJ. World Alzheimer report 2015: the global impact of dementia [Internet]. 2015. Aug [cited 2018 Apr 8]. Available from: https://www.alz.co.uk/research/world-report-2015.
    1. Prince M, Bryce R, Albanese E, Wimo A, Ribeiro W, Ferri CP. The global prevalence of dementia: a systematic review and metaanalysis. Alzheimers Dement. 2013. Jan;9(9):63–e2. - PubMed
    1. Nichols E, Szoeke CEI, Vollset SE, Abbasi N, Abd-Allah F, Abdela J, et al. Global, regional, and national burden of Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias, 1990–2016: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2016. Lancet Neurol. 2019. Jan;18(1): 88–106. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Brookmeyer R, Johnson E, Ziegler-Graham K, Arrighi HM. Forecasting the global burden of Alzheimer’s disease. Alzheimers Dement. 2007. Jul;3(3):186–91. - PubMed
    1. Hebert LE, Weuve J, Scherr PA, Evans DA. Alzheimer disease in the United States (2010–2050) estimated using the 2010 census. Neurology. 2013. May;80(19):1778–83. - PMC - PubMed

Publication types